TOURISM
Expo to benefit Yunlin
The Yunlin Agriculture Expo is expected to inject more than NT$2.3 billion (US$78.4 million) into Yunlin County’s economy during its Dec. 25 to March 6 run, a county official said on Monday. The event is forecast to generate net economic benefits of NT$1.876 billion once construction and other costs are deducted, said Chen Tung-sung (陳東松), head of the county’s Planning Department. Chen said he expected the planned expo to be the most effective investment the county government has ever made because the money injected into the local economy as a result of the expo could be up to four times the total investment in the project. The estimates were based on a 2011 Tourism Bureau survey on domestic travel habits, value-added tables for different sub-sectors from the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics and an estimate that the expo is likely to attract at least 500,000 visitors, Chen said.
TRAVEL
Visa-free destination added
Taiwanese now enjoy visa-free treatment from 134 countries and territories following an announcement by Montserrat, a British overseas territory in the Caribbean, that it has extended visa-free privileges to Taiwanese, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said on Monday. Montserrat authorities recently decided to grant visa-free treatment to Republic of China (ROC) passport holders, the ministry said in a statement. Under the program, Taiwanese are allowed to stay in Montserrat for up to six months without a visa, it added. Montserrat is the eighth British overseas territory to grant visa-free entry to ROC passport holders, according to the ministry. With an area of 102km2, Montserrat has a population of about 5,000.
An apartment building in New Taipei City’s Sanchong District (三重) collapsed last night after a nearby construction project earlier in the day allegedly caused it to tilt. Shortly after work began at 9am on an ongoing excavation of a construction site on Liuzhang Street (六張街), two neighboring apartment buildings tilted and cracked, leading to exterior tiles peeling off, city officials said. The fire department then dispatched personnel to help evacuate 22 residents from nine households. After the incident, the city government first filled the building at No. 190, which appeared to be more badly affected, with water to stabilize the
Taiwan plans to cull as many as 120,000 invasive green iguanas this year to curb the species’ impact on local farmers, the Ministry of Agriculture said. Chiu Kuo-hao (邱國皓), a section chief in the ministry’s Forestry and Nature Conservation Agency, on Sunday said that green iguanas have been recorded across southern Taiwan and as far north as Taichung. Although there is no reliable data on the species’ total population in the country, it has been estimated to be about 200,000, he said. Chiu said about 70,000 iguanas were culled last year, including about 45,000 in Pingtung County, 12,000 in Tainan, 9,900 in
DEEPER REVIEW: After receiving 19 hospital reports of suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health applied for an epidemiological investigation A buffet restaurant in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) is to be fined NT$3 million (US$91,233) after it remained opened despite an order to suspend operations following reports that 32 people had been treated for suspected food poisoning, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. The health department said it on Tuesday received reports from hospitals of people who had suspected food poisoning symptoms, including nausea, vomiting, stomach pain and diarrhea, after they ate at an INPARADISE (饗饗) branch in Breeze Xinyi on Sunday and Monday. As more than six people who ate at the restaurant sought medical treatment, the department ordered the
ALLEGED SABOTAGE: The damage inflicted by the vessel did not affect connection, as data were immediately rerouted to other cables, Chunghwa Telecom said Taiwan suspects that a Chinese-owned cargo vessel damaged an undersea cable near its northeastern coast on Friday, in an alleged act of sabotage that highlights the vulnerabilities of Taipei’s offshore communications infrastructure. The ship is owned by a Hong Kong-registered company whose director is Chinese, the Financial Times reported on Sunday. An unidentified Taiwanese official cited in the report described the case as sabotage. The incident followed another Chinese vessel’s suspected involvement in the breakages of data cables in the Baltic Sea in November last year. While fishing trawlers are known to sometimes damage such equipment, nation states have also
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